Baked Polenta with Sicilian Peperonata and Olives Reviews

Peperonata is a mixture of bell peppers, tomatoes and onion used in Italian cooking. Chef Joseph Simone of Tosca in Hingham, Massachusetts, suggests serving this quick adaptation of one of his meatless main dishes with a salad of baby greens, sliced fresh fennel and crumbled goat cheese in a simple vinaigrette. For dessert, have baked apples with cinnamon and vanilla ice cream.

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Reviews

users rating3.5/4

I think using high heat in the oven for such a small thing is too much energy to justify it. Brushing the polenta with the olive oil and then quickly frying it in a pan is just as effective and a lot quicker, using less energy. I have used this sort of recipe over the years, you can use almost any sauce or ragout and it will be delicious. My current fave is a braised organic pork shoulder chop with stock, red onion, garlic, sweet peppers and carrot, seasoned with a bit of cumin, coriander and sweet paprika, making it the day before, pulling the chop apart with my fingers. Sticking a couple of chopped green olives in a the last minute. Bit of cheese on top of the heated sauce. Any good sauce is good with polenta.

My husband doesn't
particularly like
polenta, but he
liked
this. I think it's
the texture from
browning it.
Because of the
difficulty other
reviewers have had
getting it to brown,
I broiled it -
though
it still took about
10 minutes each
side I recommend
it. I also melted
some mozzarella and
parmesan on top just
before topping with
sauce - a very nice
addition. If you
have to use dry
basil (as I did -
it's January!) add
it at the beginning
with the onion.

Overall pretty quick and easy. We also ended up with a lot more sauce than polenta. We felt the sauce was a little bit bland though...maybe next time we will roast the peppers ourselves instead of using bottled? We also added capers to the sauce and grated Pecorino Romano on top.

This was yummy, although -- in retrospect -- I should have used roasted yellow peppers to give the sauce a bit more color. Also, I found I needed to bake the polenta for much longer than 14 min for the slices to brown -- about 30 min, actually.

Delicious simple vegetarian dinner. I used diced canned tomatoes and made my own polenta, which turned out great with this recipe. Next time I will reduce the amount of Kalamata olives I add because their flavor was a little too strong. But overall this dish was excellent. And so easy to throw together once the polenta is made (or bought!) Would also be good with sausage (regular or vegetarian) added to the sauce.

I like the recipe, the flavors are great! It's been a good dish to take to parties because it is easy to reheat and portions well in a buffet. One problem though, I have a tough time browning the polenta.

I made this for a quick lunch. I didn't measure the veggies very carefully and forgot the vinegar but it was delicious anyway. I ended up with a lot more sauce than polenta, but the sauce was good by itself. :-)